Madam C. J. Walker: A washerwoman on $1.50 a day who built a business
Born Sarah Breedlove to formerly enslaved parents, she was orphaned at 7 and washed clothes for a living. She built a hair care business that trained thousands of Black women as sales agents.
Orphaned and working
Sarah Breedlove was born in 1867 in Delta, Louisiana, the first child in her family born free. She was orphaned at 7, married at 14 and widowed by 20 with a young daughter. In St. Louis she worked as a washerwoman for about $1.50 a day.
Learning to sell
Suffering from hair loss, she tried products and became a sales agent for a Black businesswoman, Annie Turnbo Malone. She learned the trade from the inside before going out on her own.
The turn
In 1905 she moved to Denver, married Charles Joseph Walker and began selling her own hair products as Madam C. J. Walker, door to door. She built a factory in Indianapolis in 1910 and a school to train sales agents.
What came of it
Thousands of Black women worked as Walker agents, earning far more than domestic work paid. She also gave money to schools and to the campaign against lynching before she died in 1919.
She learned the job as someone else's agent first, then built a business that trained others in turn. Training your people well is part of running anything.
The myth: She is sometimes said to have invented the hot comb. She did not; her business was built on scalp treatments and her method of selling and training.
Where the facts come from: A'Lelia Bundles, On Her Own Ground: The Life and Times of Madam C. J. Walker (2001); Official site, madamcjwalker.com.
